Amazon

Amazon debuted a new social feed called Spark on the iPhone in the US this past week. A little bit Pinterest, a lotta bit Instagram, Amazon has set up Spark to potentially do a number of things for the marketplace. Here are five ways the Spark platform is poised to boost Amazon’s already booming…

…search engine and home automation systems like Google’s own Nest. It’s an obvious response to Amazon’s popular Echo device and Alexa intelligent agent, introduced in the fall of 2014. But while Amazon can offer the world’s largest retail store and content inventory, Google has search and its…

…senior manager and lead for Alexa AI at Amazon, is now technical director of AI for Google Cloud.” Ram was reportedly behind the Alexa Prize, designed to further AI research and (presumably) help Amazon identify leading AI talent around the world. Amazon is trying to advance human-machine…

…and passwords, Venture Beat How will we face being defeated by machines?, The Verge Trends That Will Elevate The IoT Influence In 2018, Read/Write Amazon’s AI division is a revolving door of talent for Microsoft and Google, The Next Web Apple’s Tim Cook on iPhones, augmented reality and how he plans…

…but that the big value lies in the data generated behind the scenes. I believe we’ll see an arms race by retailers for new tech adoption given Amazon’s recent purchase of Whole Foods. Those that don’t invest will be at risk of falling behind and out of favor with consumers. Beacons have made it…

…When available, users will be able to opt-in to notifications per skill using the Amazon Alexa App and will be alerted when there’s new information to retrieve by a chime and a pulsing green light on their Amazon Echo, Echo Dot, or Echo Show device. [Read the full article on Marketing Land.] About…

…Amazon this way: That basically means all three applications are frozen until Amazon withdraws them, wins some kind of appeal, manages to change the GAC’s mind, or successfully sues. As we reported last summer, several South American nations objected to Amazon’s application because the word “amazon”…

Amazon landed in another market this week, as its Web Services (AWS) company announced a cloud-based contact center service called Amazon Connect. The company said that Connect offers the same built-from-scratch tech used by its own contact center reps. It’s metered as a service, with no upfront…